In Loving Memory
by obliviatethesilence
Summary: There is a terrible accident on a Ministry raid and Draco Malfoy comes off at the worst end of the ordeal. His memory is gone and his wife, Hermione, is in hysterics. With the help of a family he doesn't want or remember, can Draco return to normal for the sake of his child?
1. Rough Day at the Office

Hermione knew a lot of things. She knew the likelihood of being struck by lightning when standing under a large oak tree; she knew the proper way to brush and floss her teeth; she knew her grandmother's secret recipe for goulash; she knew how to brew a Pepperup Potion in no time flat, and she knew _Hogwarts: A History_ right down to the footnotes.

However, there were also a few things that Hermione did not know. Besides not knowing the capitals of all the countries in Africa, the square root of pi to the twelfth decimal place, or the content of her three-year-old daughter's wandering mind, Hermione also did not know how it could possibly take more than an hour to finish up one simple case file.

Hermione worked in the office of Magical Law Enforcement for the Ministry of Magic. She was well on her way to being promoted to department head. It was only a matter of time until her elderly boss Bartholomew Hayes finally got around to retiring, and with the anticipation of a promotion on the horizon, Hermione sometimes put in a few extra hours on the weekends to make sure she stayed on top of all of her cases.

This particular case involved a group of newly graduated Hogwarts students who thought it would be funny to bewitch the lawn of a local Muggle politician to shout profanities and obscenities whenever anyone got near it with a lawnmower. Hermione was now set on straightening out hearing dates and other important details before Monday rolled around so that she would be on top of her new stack of paperwork before it arrived.

"Be careful not to touch that," she warned the small girl sitting on the floor near her desk. The child had been reaching her hand out to grab hold of a scroll that was slowly rolling away from Hermione's desk, almost as if moving of its own accord. Hermione, however, didn't seem to be too worried about it at the present time, giving her full attention to the large book of wizarding laws open in front of her.

The little girl obediently pulled back her hand and stared up at her mother with big, curious gray eyes.

"Almost done, Mum?" she asked, resting her head against Hermione's knee with a forlorn expression in an attempt to make the woman feel guilty for extending the promised quick trip to the office. "I want pway time."

"Almost," Hermione affirmed, skimming a rather large paragraph and signing the line at the bottom. "Only a few minutes longer."

"Is Daddy done, too?" the small child questioned, clicking her small black leather shoes together in a bored manner.

"He should be done soon," Hermione mused, striking out a clause and adding a few words of her own.

"Where Daddy go?"

"He is at work. I am not exactly sure where."

She was never exactly sure. Being an Auror, when he was told there was a mission or a raid, generally it was top-secret information, just as most of her own cases were. They had fallen into the pattern of not speaking much about work related things to avoid the temptation of off-limit topics.

"Oh… It is Hal-low-ween today?" The girl took special care to pronounce her 'l' sounds, something Hermione had been chastising her for lately.

"Yes, today is Halloween, and as soon as Daddy and I are both done, we are going to go to the Leaky Cauldron for pumpkin juice and sweets. How does that sound?"

In truth, Hermione could care less that it was Halloween, but it was important for her daughter to understand traditions and to have familiar things to relate to each holiday. That alone was the sole reason for going to Diagon Alley on a Saturday evening when it was sure to be packed wall to wall with people.

"Muggles celebrate Hal-low-ween?"

"Yes, darling."

"Wizards celebrate Hal-low-ween?"

"Yes."

Hermione smiled at her daughter's curiosity. She was in the stage where everything became a question and not all of her questions had answers. While the child's father became easily frustrated by the endless stream of whys and hows and whats, Hermione thrived.

"Why?"

"All hallows eve. Witches and wizards are actually the reason that Muggles celebrate Halloween at all. Isn't that funny? They sometimes dress up in robes and hats and everything and go around begging for candy, but it started off as a celebration of our differences between the Muggle world. We wanted a reason to celebrate our abilities and our strengths, but some people went a little crazy and the Muggles caught on. They were then bewitched into thinking that the origin came elsewhere. They think it is a sort of religious holiday to honor all of the dead people in the world. Now it has become an excuse for us to dress in the normal way and do magic in public and get away with it one day a year."

Somewhere in the middle of Hermione's speech, the young girl stopped paying attention in order to play with her own curls. She only looked back up when her mother's voice stopped.

"Grandma and Grandpa are Muggles."

The thought was completely unrelated to their previous conversation, but Hermione managed to tie all the loose ends together. "Yes, they are. They celebrated Halloween with me when I was your age. I dressed up as a witch when I was four, but it wasn't until I was eleven that I learned that I was one!"

"Am I dwessing up?"

"If you would like to. If you could dress up as anything in the whole world, what would you choose?"

The small child frowned, lines of concentration forming across her brow. "A elephant," she finally said. "Like the big one at da zoo when Grandma took me dere."

"_An_ elephant," Hermione corrected gently. Once her daughter had repeated her words back to her, Hermione asked, "What sound does an elephant make?"

The little girl made a noise like a trumpeting elephant and threw her arm up in the air in front of her face like it was her trunk. Hermione chuckled and then turned back to the paperwork on her desk.

Hermione continued to sign pieces of paper, drawing very near to the bottom of the pile she was working on. All three of the boys involved in the lawn incident would be receiving adult hearings, but hopefully not too severe of a punishment. She would do her best to ensure that they only obtained minor charges, but were then too scared to attempt anything of the sort again. Hermione had found that since she had become a mother, she had become less and less strict with other people's children, taking her own maternal feelings into account.

The little girl frowned up at her mother for ignoring her again and started to scoot toward the wandering scroll to return it in the hopes of receiving praise for being helpful.

The woman glanced over at the last possible second. "No!" Hermione gasped as small fingers grasped the tightly wound piece of paper. When they did, the paper burst into flame and turned to dust in the child's hand.

Immediately the girl started crying, large tears spilling down her face. Hermione sighed and set down her quill, reaching over to scoop her daughter onto her lap. "Now what did I tell you, darling? I said not to touch that scroll. There are many dangerous things in this office and you must always listen to Mummy when she tells you not to touch, okay? There are bad men and women that Mummy deals with at work, and not all of them are considerate enough to leave scrolls lying around that don't bite back when you pick them up."

The little girl sniffled and nodded her assent.

"Now let me see your hand."

The girl held it out for Hermione to examine with a fresh round of tears. There was not even a red mark to be seen. Hermione made a fake noise of sympathy, which she knew was the child's ultimate goal. With a smirk she mused, "Oh, well this might have to come off. The whole hand. This looks bad."

Immediately the tears stopped as the small face bent forward to examine her own hand in surprise. "Rewwy? Real bad?"

"Definitely."

"No, no, no! It don't even hurt! It doesn't even-!"

"Shhh," Hermione calmed her child with a smirk, cupping the sides of the small face in between her palms. "I know." She gave the back of the girl's hand a quick kiss and said, "There. All better now."

The girl's delighted giggles were drowned out by the sound of the clanking lifts at the end of the floor. Hermione turned her head just in time to see Ron appear, his face streaked with dirt and his expression wild. He spotted Hermione at her desk almost instantly and lunged forward with little to no thought, breaking into a run.

Hermione stared at him in surprise, sure that he had been on the mission today. "Ron, what-?"

"Hermione, you need to come with me right now!" He was out of breath and clutching his side. He was extremely in shape for the amount of training he had gone through to become an Auror, so Hermione knew he must have pushed himself extremely hard to be in this disheveled state. Instantly her defenses went up.

"But why? What's happened?"

"Uncle Ron!" the little girl wailed happily, hopping off of Hermione's lap as she attempted to hug his legs, oblivious to the seriousness of the situation at hand. "Happy Haween!" Her voice was muffled from his kneecaps.

Ron patted her head absentmindedly, but his eyes were locked on Hermione's, seeking her understanding. "There's been an accident on our mission. At the Manor."

The Manor. They must have raided the Malfoy's place that day. Why they had not told her, she had no idea, but it was no matter now.

Hermione was on her feet in an instant, her face creased with worry but her voice as steady as ever. "Take me to him."

* * *

There were some days in his life when Draco would forget how to feel. He would purposely push past his own reality and stay submersed some place in the back of his mind where there was no thought and no emotion. Being an Auror meant that you could not get too attached to the things or people around you. There was a constant risk of losing everything you held near and dear. So he fought his feelings and sought his own form of solitude on a daily basis.

Yet, as he was standing outside his childhood home next to Harry Potter, his former enemy, and twisting his wedding ring to quell his nerves, Draco Malfoy could not _stop _feeling.

"Are you okay, Draco?" Harry asked, eyeing his colleague nervously. Draco nodded, keeping his eyes focused on their goal: his big childhood manor looming through the fog in front of them. That house held more memories for Draco than any place else in the world, save perhaps Hogwarts, and they were all plaguing his mind at once, each fighting like a rabid dog for their turn to be thought of.

300 meters to their left he could just see Ron, Neville, and Savage assuming much the same position that they were in themselves, lurking just beyond sight of the vast front windows.

They had not needed a fifth team member for this particular mission, but Longbottom had volunteered anyway. It was likely because they were all nervous that he had come here to perform a raid on his own parents and they thought the extra backup would be necessary. Draco very nearly resented that.

"Repeat the plan."

Potter was always making sure that every plan was perfect before they went anywhere. Presumably Weasley or Savage was doing the same thing on the opposite side of the property. Draco did not understand the point of this as all their plans always fell to shit regardless.

"The plan is to find out what my father is up to." Draco swallowed the lump that was rising in his throat. "Rumor has it that he has gone senile since the fall of V-Voldemort and that he might be doing something extremely dangerous for himself and everyone in the area." Draco was still unused to using the Dark Lord's name, but it was something he had been working on for several years, and he could now nearly say it without flinching.

"He likely does not even fully comprehend what he's doing. So we are going to take him to the Ministry for questioning by whatever means necessary."

Draco felt a hand on his arm and he glanced over to meet Harry's eyes. "Are you sure you are ready for this, Draco?" There was so much concern dripping from Potter's voice that Draco was half convinced he was going to lean in for a kiss.

He shook off Harry's hand and nodded his head roughly. "For Merlin's sake, Potter, I'm fine. So what if my father is crazy, right? I can't say I did not see it coming. He has always been a little off his broomstick."

"It's not nothing."

"It isn't _something _either." Draco knew he was lying, and so did Harry, but they chose to collectively ignore it and push forward. Some battles between them were best not fought as neither would win. It would only create the former wall of resentment that neither man ever wanted to return.

Their teammates mirrored them from the opposite end and together they crept closer, keeping special eye on rooms in the manor that were well lit so as not to be attacked before they even reached their target. Draco wondered which spec of light held each of his parents.

No doubt his mother was in the parlor, sitting by herself and reading or knitting as she so often did. Perhaps her house elf was with her—loyal little thing that it was. His father, however, had become something of a mystery to him. For all Draco knew, his father was doing a ritualistic dance around the fireplace where his mother was tied like a suckling pig. He pushed the image to the back of his mind as they pressed forward.

He had not seen either of his parents in nearly four and a half years, and being so close to them now was making his blood itch uncomfortably. He had written his mother at least once a month since he had gotten his job with the Ministry, but he had never received a response, not even for his wedding invitation or at the announcement of his child.

They came to a stop about fifteen meters from the big wrought-iron fence that surrounded the property and made eye contact with Ron from across the way. The red haired man gave them a slow nod to which Draco gruffly responded, "On your call then, Potter."

There were about thirty seconds of painful silence that felt stretched over thirty hours before Harry finally whispered, "Go."

All five of them stood and broke out in a run toward the Manor. The grass was wet from the fog and more than once Draco felt like he was slipping, and he would not have minded if he had. However, he managed to keep himself upright for the entire sprint to the gargantuan fence.

Draco slipped through a gap gate where he knew the space between the posts to be slightly wider than the others from years of playing in that very garden. Harry followed his lead, but they could hear the other three ungracefully blasting things out of their way as they neared the front doors.

Draco caught sight of his mother through one of the front windows and stopped in his tracks, meeting her eyes. She did not seem frightened, but eyed him with such a look of pure loathing that he almost turned around and walked right back through the gap in the fence, abandoning the mission entirely.

His throat tightened and his pulse quickened as she looked away, walking back into the house with the dignified manner she always seemed to possess. She had saved the Wizarding World on his behalf, and he had betrayed her, leaving her to rot with a man who was not even in his right mind. Guilt plagued him to his core.

Harry glanced back. "Can you continue?" he called over his shoulder, noticing the pained expression on Draco's face.

The thought struck him that Potter was expecting him to fail. "Yes," he grunted, not wanting to appear weak. He would not prove Harry right today. He would see this through.

Draco tightened his grip on his wand, but rushed back to Harry's side and through the front door, which Savage had already blasted out of their way. Neville and Ron had already entered and were already in search of inhabitants.

"This is the Ministry of Magic. We have a warrant. We are here to search the premises. Lucius Malfoy, we wish to speak with you!" Ron's voice rang through the hallway, speaking with the dignified tone he had been trained to first use in any raid. As second ticked by, his tone became more urgent, but it began to fade as he penetrated deeper into the manor.

Draco hung back in the entrance with Harry and Savage, wands raised and eyes peeled.

He could now hear Longbottom calmly questioning his mother on the other side of the wall. Weasley's voice joined the noise, as well as a squeak that might have belonged to a house elf. His mother broke out in a chorus of angry shouts, forcing them to stun her by the sound of the thud that hit the wooden floor. Draco cringed against the noise. He longed to rush through the door to the parlor and help her, but he had more pressing issues to worry about.

"Where would your father be?" Harry asked, his hand grasping Draco's shoulder tightly, pulling his attention back to where he stood.

"S-study probably," Draco forced out, bracing himself against a wall for support, but pointing up the stairs. He managed to convince his legs to steady themselves as he headed up the stairs on Potter's heals, wincing as the sound of another door being blasted off its hinges reached his ears.

They were slowly tearing apart what had once been his home, and there was nothing he could do to stop it because it had been mostly his idea to begin with. "Let's see if the rumors are true," he had said in their last meeting. "Let's see what my father is up to. Perhaps he really is a danger. He may still have dark objects in the house that could really harm others, my mother, or himself. At the very least we might be able to discredit the rumors. Let us go and see."

Of course they had agreed. Harry and Ron had wanted to raid the manor for a couple years already but had not mentioned it for Draco's sake. They had not wanted to upset him by causing a raid on his family, so he had made the choice for them, but to what end?

"Who's there? What's going on?" His father's voice was high-pitched and on-edge. The rumors were clearly true. Draco reached the top of the stairs and saw his father sitting on a broken and overturned crate with a cauldron wedged between his legs, stacks of empty boxes and broken bottles littered the once-immaculate room. The cauldron was smoking and emitting a foul odor that smelled like a mix of spoiled milk and sulfur. Draco's eyes began to water.

His father looked as though he had not brushed his hair in months. It was mangy and matted like a blonde lion's mane around his face. His hands were caked and blistered with remnants of who knew what and his clothes were torn and spotted with bits and pieces of what likely had come from the broken containers on the floor. His face was gaunt and he had lost a fair amount of weight since Draco had last seen him.

"Lucius Malfoy, you are under arrest by the Ministry of Magic for the mixing of unknown and potentially illegal substances and harboring dark—" Savage was cut off as Lucius slashed his wand rudely through the air, knocking the other man off his feet. Savage collapsed in an unconscious heap on the floor without so much as a twitch. Draco started to rush to the fallen man, but Harry held up a hand to stop him.

At once, Lucius' eyes rose to meet his son's and a crude smile took over his face, making him look grotesque and haggard in the dim lighting.

"Is that Draco?" Lucius asked, standing up, albeit shakily, to get a good look over Harry's shoulder at his son. Lucius began laughing in a way that made the hair on the back of Draco's neck stand on end.

"My son? An Auror? Working as a lapdog for the Minister of Magic, are you Draco?" He stuck his tongue out so that it curled over his upper teeth maliciously. There was no hint of sanity lingering in his eyes, merely the remnants of a need that could no longer be filled.

"You were a lapdog, too. Isn't that right, Father? A lapdog to a man with no lap to sit upon…" His words were quiet, but he knew Lucius had heard him. They seemed to go unregistered, however, as his father continued his tirade.

"Marrying mudbloods, arresting all your old friends, forgetting your poor family who risked all they had for your sake… _Traitor_. What has become of you? "

"I should be asking you the same thing!" His voice was rising in anger he had not known he felt as his wand thrust forward, shooting out red sparks. Draco winced as he received a sharp elbow in the ribs from Harry. He had almost gone too far. He had almost compromised their mission.

"Come quietly, or we will have to take you by force, Lucius. The Ministry wants to grant you a hearing, but we will forgo that step if you push us to. All we want is to talk."

Lucius simply laughed again, kicking a bottle out of his way as he strode closer to Harry, causing it to shatter loudly on the opposite wall. Draco could hear Neville audibly cringe from over his shoulder. By this point he and Ron were in the doorway behind Draco, their eyes wide as they took in the state of the room.

Lucius jabbed his wand into Harry's chest and twisted rudely, causing a collective intake of breath. Draco's wand had been up and pointed since his arrival, but his grip tightened as he watched his father with eyes like a hawk. Ron and Neville's wands rose to join his so quickly that Draco could have sworn they materialized next to him out of thin air.

"Don't do anything rash," Harry said softly as a warning. Draco snorted in disgust, but did not fire. He was so ready for revenge on the man who had almost kept him from happiness that it took everything inside of him to continue to obey Harry's order.

"Listen here, Potter." His father was spitting venom into Harry's face, but he did not cringe or look away. "You may have defeated the Dark Lord, but you will never catch all the rest of us. You are pathetic. You are weak. You are nothing. And you may have turned my own son against me, but you will never take me of my own free will, do you understand? DO YOU?"

"I'm sorry, Malfoy," Harry's voice was as steady as he could possibly make it, but there was no mistaking the fear hiding behind it. "By order of Kingsley Shacklebolt, the Minister of Magic, I'm afraid that—"

Before anyone could react, Lucius had taken his wand and turned to thrust it into Draco's throat. Gagging and spitting, Draco tried to back away, but his father reached out and gripped his upper arm tightly, refusing to relinquish. Ron's hands tried to grab hold of the back of his robes, but they failed, the fabric sliding from his grasp.

"You think you are one of them, Draco? Do you think they would risk their lives to save you?" Draco eyed Harry, Ron, and Neville who all had their wands raised, but none of whom made any sort of move to free him at this point.

Before they arrived they had discussed how to handle the possibility that Lucius actually was crazy, and if so, they did not know what might set him off. It was right of them to hang back, but Lucius saw it as betrayal.

The look or horror in Neville's eyes told Draco just how wrong his father was. He had made friends with the very people he had so long looked to as the enemy, and they would do whatever it took to save him. He knew that to be true without question.

"You think they care about you? Your mother and I care about you, Draco. That is where your loyalties lie, and if you can't remember that, then I will have to help you!" Lucius' wand sank deeper into Draco's flesh, causing small black dots to materialize in his vision, making him half-blind from pain.

"NO!" Harry shouted, lifting his wand to Lucius's chest and shouting, "_Expelliarmus_!"

Lucius blocked the spell easily with a harsh laugh. Neville, always the first to resort to physical violence, immediately cast his wand to the side as he rushed forward to knock the older man to the ground. However, before he could connect with his target, Lucius had already screamed, "_OBLIVIATE_!"

There was a flash of white light as Draco was thrown off his feet and into the large china cabinet against the wall, shattering some of his family's precious heirlooms. There was the sound of high, cold laughter and then everything went black.

* * *

Hermione raced down the long, white corridor, accidentally knocking people out of her way, but with no time to stop and apologize. She could hear Ron grunting behind her as he was having trouble running with the awkward-sized three-year old in his arms. She was too small to be able to keep up herself, yet too big to comfortably support in a face-paced situation.

The smell of walls and rooms that were far too clean reminded her of her parent's dentist office and the days in her youth when she would sit in the corner with a book as they went about their business. This time the smell only reminded her that she was in a hospital. All of them smelled the same whether they were magical or not. They smelled just as bland, helpless, and empty as the white paint on their walls.

"Keep going," Ron panted, directing her where they needed to go. "Straight to the double doors at the end of the ward past the painting of the Healer with pie-shaped hat on his head."

Hermione did not acknowledge that he had spoken, but she did as he said, not even bothering to make a sarcastic comment on his apparent need to compare everything to food.

As she neared the double doors, she spotted Harry pacing back and forth, his head down, his hands clasped behind his back. Neville was seated on the floor, his hands covered in blood, but otherwise seeming only mildly shaken.

Hermione's hair was flying everywhere, and she pushed it roughly behind her ears, not bothering to catch her breath before blurting out, "What's happened? Where is Draco?"

* * *

A/n: Well, I'm not sure if this as intriguing as it is in my head, but I hope you enjoyed it. This story should end up being more than 20 chapters by the time I'm done. This is sort of just a preview of what's going on and I hope that it gleaned enough interest that at least a couple people pester me into getting up the next chapter very soon. This story is going to sound cliche in some parts, but I assure that it won't end up that way. Again, I hope you liked it, and I look forward to hearing everyone's initial thoughts whether good or bad!

-Ashley


	2. Tired of Waiting

"Where is he?" Her voice was so harsh it could have cut through diamonds like they were butter.

Harry stopped pacing to stare at her, his eyes hidden from view behind a thin layer of dust that had settled on his glasses. "Hermione."

"_Where_ is Draco?"

Her patience, which was already thin, was wearing thinner as Harry continued to study her face. His teeth visibly gnawed on the inside of his cheek and he stretched out time in an effort to remain silent as long as possible. He knew that her reaction would be unpleasant at best.

"Harry Potter, tell me right now where he is. He's through there, isn't he?" Hermione pointed to the double doors Harry was currently standing in front of as he guiltily looked over his shoulder at them.

"Well, if you weren't trying to be obvious—" Hermione started for the doors, shoving Harry aside as she went. He grabbed her wrist tightly and held her back, gritting his teeth uncomfortably.

"Hermione, let me explain what—"

Her hair whipped him across the face as she snapped to face him, wrenching her wrist free from his grasp. "No. Let me see him first. Then you can explain. I just need to know that he is okay."

"Well, the thing is that he's no—"

"Harry," Neville cut in, slowly getting to his feet as he uncomfortably glanced between his two bickering friends. "She's not going to rest until she sees him. Imagine if it were Ginny in there."

Harry turned to face Hermione with sad eyes. Everyone could see the debate raging inside his head between what he knew was right and what he knew was necessary.

"If it were Ginny," Hermione repeated Neville's words seriously, knowing that his view would soften at the repeated mention of his wife.

"You can go in," he said softly, causing a sigh of relief to escape her. "But you _can't_ talk to him, Hermione. You can't even let him see you. Promise us that. You can go through the doors, you can see him, and you can walk back out, but you cannot linger. Then we will explain."

Harry balled his fists and fought back a cringe as Hermione nodded, eagerly pushing him out of the way so she could enter the ward beyond the set of double doors. Whatever she expected to see, it was not what lay before her.

She knew that there had been an accident and that Draco had been the one who had come out of it with injuries. She expected that he would be hurt, possibly even barely clinging to life, supported by Healing staff and lots of enchantments. She expected to see bandages and blood and maybe even acidic, pus-filled open wounds, but she did not expect to see what was actually lying in the bed near the end of the ward.

Draco was sleeping peacefully, seemingly without any injuries. He looked as he always did—no pain, no scrapes, no bruises. He was okay. He was not seemingly hurt in any way. He didn't have as much as a scrape. Harry, Ron, and Neville had obviously exaggerated the situation. Draco must have just been extremely tired and she knew better than anyone how he could get when he was tired. No wonder they'd been touchy about letting her wake him if he'd been in one of his moods.

There was no reason why she shouldn't wake him up just so that he would know she was there. There was nothing to hold her back from simply shaking him lightly and telling him it was going to be okay and letting him go back to sleep.

She began to rush toward him, a smile breaking out over her features before she was rudely yanked back by the neck of her robes and a hand promptly placed over her mouth. "Drac—umph!"

"Shh," Harry hissed, spinning her around and half-guiding, half-forcing her back through the double doors. "Do_ not_ wake him up. We don't want to deal with him again right now."

"What do you mean, 'deal with him'? His moods aren't all that bad, especially not with me. He looked fine. Maybe a little paler than usual, but that's not saying much…" She looked between Harry, Ron, and Neville in confusion, searching for an answer that she knew they had.

After a round of awkward silence, Neville let out a sigh and spun her to face the sign that hung next to the ward doors.

_Janus Thickey  
Permanent Spell Damage_

Hermione stared at the sign for a few seconds as she thought back to their fifth year. Her photographic memory led her straight to the image she was searching for. "But-but Neville, isn't this where-?"

"My parents live, yes." Neville spoke so quietly that she had to strain to hear him.

Fear struck her so deeply that she was afraid every part of her right down to her internal organs was quivering. "Draco's not...? He isn't…? He can't be… _Tell me_." She was practically begging them now, unable to look away from the sign that was becoming blurry in front of her as tears threatened to fall.

Draco could not be like Neville's parents, an invalid, a vegetable. Just that morning he had been so full of life as he had danced his way around the kitchen preparing toast and coffee for the both of them, and now he was facing a fate worse than death. He would be handing their daughter Drooble's wrappers for the rest of his life without a clue as to why he was doing it. A sob caught in her throat and Neville wrapped his steady arms around her from behind, just holding her as she cried.

"Hermione, it's not _exactly_ what you think," Harry offered. "He is probably more comparable to Lockhart than Neville's parents. They are not even sure if it's permanent. He just… forgot."

Harry spoke as though having a husband who could barely remember his own name and spent the whole day coloring was more favorable to a husband who could not remember his own name and spent the whole day lying about. She did not see the difference.

Hermione twisted back around to face them, her expression stern. "Forgot _what_, Harry?"

"Everything," Ron offered lightly, still holding the small girl who was drifting off to sleep in his arms, unable to follow the conversation amidst the confusion.

"He thinks he's sixteen again. He can't remember anything that has happened in the past ten years. He knows who he is, but he does not know much beyond that even though he thinks he does." Hermione heard Harry's words, but she did not understand them.

"So, you mean he can't remember me? Not as I am, at any rate. And he can't remember our daughter? He can't even remember the war?"

"The only thing he's really said so far has been to shout for his father and some tea. He thinks that the Ministry kidnapped him while he was working on his mission for Voldemort and brought him here to keep him out of the way."

"Did he see you?"

"Yes. That's what brought that idea on. He thought I was in cahoots with Scrimgeour. He told me that my disguise wasn't adequate enough for him to not recognize me. In his words, '_Potter, I would recognize that hideous scar and those bloody ridiculous glasses anywhere, so don't act like you had nothing to do with this_.'"

"Disguise?"

"Hermione, I'm twenty-five. The last time he remembers seeing me I was sixteen. I'm certain I look a bit different now."

"I'll say," Ron mumbled, prodding Harry's slightly more prominent waistline with his elbow. One stern look from Hermione quieted the smirk on his face instantly.

"You said they don't know if it's permanent? Then why is he here?"

"They don't know much of anything right now, except that he refuses to listen to anyone until his father gets here, which we both know is never going to happen."

Neville answered her second question, feeling responsible to answer any questions pertaining directly to his parent's long-term home. "He's here, Hermione, because it might be permanent. These Healers here are the best at memory recovery, so if he has any chance whatsoever, it'll be with them. He is going to be here for more than a few days, so they figured it would be reasonable to give him a decent bed. He is being taken care of as a personal friend to the Minister."

"Remind me to thank Kingsley later," Hermione mumbled, fidgeting with the hem of her scarf. She did not want to think about what would become of their family right now. She did not want to think at all. In fact, thinking was the one thing she was going to work her hardest to avoid doing. However, there were some questions that could not be avoided, which was led her to ask, "What exactly happened on the raid?"

"Lucius. He—he wiped Draco's memory. But we don't think he knew what he was doing exactly, so he didn't pick a specific length of time to wipe out. You know better than any of us how memory charms work. He's just like Lockhart. He was attacked with no specific memories in mind."

"So it was a blind removal… That was incredibly stupid and dangerous and—"

"Hermione, Lucius isn't in his right mind. All of the rumors are true. You should have seen him. To say he looked awful would be being generous. Luckily, we think his wand has been turning on him due to his random bouts of insanity, so it likely picked a span of time that it felt was appropriate. Draco shares Lucius' blood, and that's probably the only factor that kept him from being wiped back to infancy."

Just as Harry finished his brief explanation, a very sweet old woman in Healer's robes came out from the ward. She glanced around at the group of them and her eyes focused on Hermione. "We're finished running tests now. Am I correct in assuming that you are Mrs. Malfoy?"

Hermione nodded and the witch continued.

"I'm Healer Malone. It's a pleasure to meet you. We have determined that Mr. Malfoy likely does not have permanent brain damage, but rather that his more recent thoughts have all been clouded by the spell performed on him. It is possibly to revive obliviated memories, but it is a very difficult feat. It might even be impossible. However, because the spell was not targeted at a specific set of memories, it did a shoddy job of removing them entirely. More or less, the spell simply put a coat of paint over them that needs to be wiped away before they can be viewed properly again."

"He can still remember?" Hermione affirmed.

The witch nodded. "It is possible. He will need to _want_ it for it to happen, however. You cannot force him to remember. And by the sounds of it, he has not the will or the patience for the task right now. He is torn between wanting to see his father and living in fear that his father will come to punish him for messing up on some sort of mission. It is all he keeps repeating. We think if one of you went in to explain things to him, perhaps a friendly familiar face might jog a few memories."

Hermione instantly volunteered, stepping forward before Healer Malone's sentence was even completed, but Neville held her back. "Let Harry do it. I know from experience that spell damage isn't easy to handle right away, Hermione."

Harry nodded and went to step toward Healer Malone, but Hermione challenged his position. "It should be me, Harry," she argued. "If any of us is going to be able to jog a memory, it will be me."

"Be that as it may, Hermione… What if we can't make him remember anything today? What if he only starts yelling and cursing at us like he once did? It will only upset you."

"Then let it upset me." Hermione's voice was practically a growl.

"Mum?" a small voice asked from Ron's arms, a pair of large gray eyes staring around her at the small circle of people.

"Oh, is this your child?" the Healer exclaimed with a joyous squeal. "I never see my own grandchildren very often anymore due to distance. My children both moved out of the country, you see. I've got one in Ireland and another in the States." She placed a finger on the girl's nose who crinkled it with a giggle. "What's your name, sweetheart?"

"Lacey," the girl chirped. "Lacetonia Andromeda Malfoy."

"What a pretty name!"

"Who are you?"

"Lacey, that's rude," Hermione scolded, but Healer Malone brushed it aside, scoffing at Hermione's harsh tone with a string of tongue clicking that could have rivaled even Mrs. Weasley's no-nonsense tutting.

"I am your father's Healer."

"Daddy sick?"

"Yes he is, but it is a very strange sort of sick. Tell me Lacey, do you love your father?"

Lacey nodded enthusiastically, rubbing the tired from her eyes.

"Well, Miss Lacey, I will do my very best to make your father better. How does that sound?"

"Good," Lacey mumbled, sleepily burying her face in Ron's shoulder.

Hermione looked between the Healer and her daughter with a fierce expression. "Can I please see Draco now?"

"Perhaps it would be best if Mr. Potter accompanied me for the moment. We will send for you if he asks, Mrs. Malfoy. There is a waiting room down the hall on the left if you would care to stay for awhile."

Hermione glared as Harry followed the woman back into the ward and shut the door in her face.

Hermione glanced over at Ron's watch and saw that it was just past eight. Harry had been in the ward for over two hours now and they had not heard anything about what was going on, neither from him or Healer Malone.

Lacey was curled up in Ron's lap, one of her hands clinging to the front of his shirt because she needed something to act as her teddy bear. He was watching her with a strange expression, looking very much like he wanted to nod off and join her in the land of dreams.

"Thank you for watching her," Hermione whispered to break the silence. "I often expect so much of you, Ginny, and Harry, yet you never question…"

"Hermione, you know that we-" Ron started, but he cut himself off as the small person in his arms stirred restlessly at his voice.

"I know, but it still means a lot." Hermione pieced together his thought for him as she found herself so often doing.

Ron met her gaze for a long while before letting his head lean back to rest against the wall behind his chair, allowing his eyes to drift shut.

Hermione picked up a newspaper from the table next to her chair and began to skim through, reading only articles that seemed to have no basis in actual fact. A distraction was all she needed.

She had made it to her third article, a short clipping about a woman named Virginia Hunts who was convinced that she was a reincarnation of Merlin himself, when she heard a tiny voice talking to her.

"Mum?" She glanced over to Ron who was sound asleep with his mouth slightly open, soft snores resounding from somewhere in his throat. Her daughter was still in the same snuggled position on his lap, except now her eyes were open and staring unblinkingly at their mother's.

"Mom, where's Daddy? Why we in a hospital?"

"Your father is sick," Hermione said honestly, trying her best to sound cheerful. "Uncle Harry is with him and he is going to tell us how Daddy is doing very soon."

"Why can't we see him?"

"Do you know how when you get sick it sometimes makes me or daddy sick, too? Well daddy doesn't want to make you sick."

The girl's face screwed up in concentration. "But I don't go to the hospital when I get sick. Daddy must be real sick."

"Very sick," Hermione agreed.

"Uncle Harry will not get sick?"

"No, darling. Uncle Harry won't get sick. No need to worry."

"Where did Mr. Neville go?"

"He went home to Miss Hannah. Do you remember Miss Hannah?"

The small blonde nodded enthusiastically, her curls bouncing. "Yes! She is the nice lady with the cocoa, right?"

"Right. She runs The Three Broomsticks. You've been there once. Miss Hannah made you her special hot chocolate even though it was hot outside. I am sure it would taste much better now that the weather is colder."

"Mr. Neville went home?"

"Yes."

"To get special hot choc-o-late?" She pronounced chocolate with every syllable separately, making sure she could not be corrected for any mistakes.

"I'm sure he did, love."

Just as Lacey was about to ask something more about Neville and the hot chocolate, the door to the waiting room opened and Harry slipped inside.

"Uncle Harry!" the girl screamed, sliding off of Ron's lap and rushing to the other man.

Ron awoke with a start, coughing and sputtering. "I'm awake, I'm awake," he grunted, trying to hide a yawn by gruffly rubbing at his goatee.

Hermione was on her feet in an instant, wanting answers more quickly than Harry was capable of speaking.

Harry had scooped Lacey up and was currently in a discussion about Miss Hannah and the hot cocoa.

"Have you ever met Miss Hannah, Uncle Harry?"

"I went to school with Hannah."

"Did she make hot choc-o-late in school, too?"

"I'm not sure if she—"

Hermione cleared her throat with her hands on her hips, staring at the two gossipers. "Can this wait until later?" she asked sternly.

Harry nodded and sat down in the chair next to where Hermione had been sitting, placing the young girl on his knee. Hermione resumed her own seat and Harry started talking without being prompted.

"He's being difficult. You knew he would be. He realized right away that I actually am older and this isn't a costume, and he saw himself in a mirror, so he knows he's older, too. Yet he's convinced that we somehow pulled him through time to stop him from completing his mission. He doesn't comprehend that time has already passed and his mission failed nearly ten years ago. He would not even attempt to listen when I brought you into the conversation. He called you a—Again, he just referred to you as—"

"I'm just 'the mudblood' to him again, aren't I?" Her voice was void of all emotion, her eyes dull.

"I'm so sorry, Hermione… But—but they said that there's hope. He just needs time to remember and to re-adjust. He's been through a lot today. His head might just need a night of sleep."

"He promised," Hermione said quietly, wringing her hands. "He promised that he would never go back. Not to that. He swore to me no matter what that he wouldn't and—"

"It wasn't his choice. He was given the option of staying behind today, but he didn't. He knew we needed him to successfully get to his father. He was brave. You know how brave he is better than anyone. He knew the risks. It's still your Draco in there somewhere, Hermione. You just have to find him."

Hermione breathed in through her teeth, allowing the ice cold of the air to distract her from everything else. Draco could not be back to the man he had fought so hard to run from. It was not possible that the sweet, caring person who had so recently emerged was suddenly back inside his shell of rage and denial.

"Daddy still sick?" Lacey asked, grabbing Harry's face between both of her hands so that he would be forced to pay attention to her.

"Yes, Daddy's still sick," Hermione answered dryly.

"They said that the best thing for him would be rest, familiar faces, and maybe pictures—things to prove that we're not lying to him."

"Familiar faces?"

"Hermione don't. Not today."

"Harry, don't you tell me that you get to go have a jolly two-hour chat with my husband and then expect me to just go home and come back tomorrow like a new day is going to make any difference! If Draco needs familiar faces, then he needs his family. He needs us."

"That chat was far from jolly, and he's not going to—"

"Then he won't remember we're his family! So what? That's fine because _I _remember we're his family. Family doesn't quit. They don't give up. Not even for a minute. You should know that better than anyone, Harry Potter."

With that, Hermione grabbed her daughter's hand and strode from the waiting room. She continued walking until she had reached the double doors to the Janus Thickey ward. She took a deep breath and pushed through them, ignoring greetings from the three Healers standing at a desk against the wall.

She kept walking until she was standing by Draco's bedside, her hand still firmly clasping that of her daughter's. He was sleeping by the looks of it, his eyebrows drawn together slightly in the middle as though he were entering into a nightmare. Hermione did not care how much he needed sleep because right now she just needed _him_.

"Draco Lucius Malfoy, you look at me this instant."

His eyes didn't open, but her words clearly woke him as he gave a slight jolt. "God Granger, I know you have a big mouth, but must it come around to disturb my nap?" His eyes finally slid open, meeting hers instantly.

Her heart dropped into her feet. With a sharp intake of breath that pulled cold air painfully into her lungs all too quickly, Hermione looked away from his gaze as though she had been burned by his eyes. There was no trace of the man she married lingering in his frosty gray pupils. This man was hard, cold, and absent from everything that had transpired since the war. Her heartbreak was interrupted by an ecstatic squeal.

"Daddy!" Lacey cried, throwing herself onto Draco's bed and across his stomach with a bout of giggles, wrapping him in an enthusiastic hug.

* * *

A/N: I know it's been awhile, and for that I apologize. I have a hard time finding motivation sometimes and for some reason I found some today so I wrote a couple of chapters and I hope that I find motivation again soon. I'm always open if you find a grammatical error and even more so if you want to submit theories or suggestions for what you think should happen! It sometimes gives me little ideas. So basically I hope you liked it, and there's going to be a lot of flashbacks starting in the next chapter which I'm really excited about, and I hope everyone else is too!

xo Ashley


	3. One Ring

"Daddy!" Lacey hit Draco's stomach, causing him to grunt in discomfort. She did not seem to notice, however, as she nestled into him with a happy grin. "I won't get sick, Mum? Are you better now?"

"What is_ this_?" he sneered, staring down at her with cold eyes, disgust coating his features.

"Daddy, are you better? Mum says we going to get treats for Hallo-ween. Are we getting treats? Do you want pumpkin juice or you want cider? I want a caramel apple with the little bits of licorice."

Lacey prattled on about plans Draco did not know he had previously made as he continued to gawk at the blonde creature that was virtually sitting on his lap.

"That is your daughter," Hermione said calmly, wishing with all of her might that he would look at their child and suddenly remember everything. There was no need for them to go through this hardship if he would simply remember.

"I do not have a daughter."

Hermione's heart sank in her chest, diminishing what little hope she had left.

"Yes, you do," she pressed. "And this is her. Draco, please believe me." She sat down on the edge of his bed and rested her hand on his knee.

"Don't touch me you filthy mudblood! You think you can come in here and tell me some bullshit story about—"

"Draco, please! You don't have to remember everything now, but do not talk like that in front of her! She's a child!"

Lacey was now staring between her bickering parents in confusion. "No fighting," she urged, reaching out a small hand to touch the side of her mother's face.

Hermione leaned into the warmth of her daughter's fingers, allowing them to calm her agitated nerves.

Draco stared at the transaction between Granger and the child with squinted eyes. The little thing did look an awful lot like him—blonde hair, gray eyes, pale skin—but it did not mean that it belonged to him. They could easily have found a child that fit the criteria and stolen it to help get him on their side. Adopted it was more likely knowing how chivalrous Potter and his friends were. All morals and no true grasp of power or cunning.

"Malfoy families do not have daughters before they have sons," he stated matter-of-factly.

"Well then, your child was a first, wasn't she?"

Granger was not shaken, although Draco had not expected her to be. Their plan was brilliant, but they had forgotten one tiny detail, and that was him. He would not be tricked by Potter yet again, even if the trap was so well laid. He was far too intelligent to have the robes pulled over his eyes by a small blonde girl and an aging potion.

"What's the kid's name?" There were only certain names that he would ever consider naming a child, and if it was anything but one of those, he would know that she was lying through her teeth.

"_You_ tell _me_," Hermione said dully, searching for the answer to her question in his eyes. He had been the one to name their daughter and perhaps something about the name was still hovering on the surface of his brain.

_"Lacetonia. We'll call her Lacey," _he'd said proudly the day she was born._ "It means beautifully twisted together. And that's what our lives have become."_

"Oh yes, of course, let's try to trick poor Draco into abandoning his mission and his family so that we can win the war and then we can chuck him out into the cold after he gives up all the secrets to getting the rest of his family killed! Let's make him feel warm and fuzzy and make him think that he gave up his backbone to fall arse over elbow with a mudblood who has a bush instead of a head. No thank you, Granger, but I am not going to fall for that. I might not be brilliant, buck-toothed Hermione Granger, but I've still got a brain. You must be barmy if you think I'm going to fall for your little plot. Whatever name I toss out is the name you'll go with and I'm not an idiot."

"Draco, we're not trying to trick you. The war is over. It happened over eight years ago. We _are_ your family now. Do you think it would be easy for me to sit here and admit all of this given the Hermione that you remember? Do you think she would sit here and pretend to be married to the boy she despised most in the world? No. I would not have. Please believe me when I say that this was all your choice, but ten years is a long time to forget. Things change. People change. _Lives_ change."

"Not like this. I would not have been so foolish."

"Daddy come home now?" Lacey urged Hermione with a confused expression, tugging gently on the sleeve of her mother's robes.

"Not yet, darling," Hermione whispered, pushing some of her daughter's curls behind her ears as she leaned over to kiss the top of her head.

"Not ever, _darling_," Draco mimicked, causing the child to stare at him, her face painted over with hurt and confusion.

"Not _ever_? Daddy's not coming home?" Her bottom lip started to quiver, and just as Draco covered his ears, the crying started. He grimaced and tried to shake her off of his bed as Hermione scooped her up, balancing her on one hip as she stood and started to bounce, humming something vaguely familiar, but he was not sure where from.

"Shhh… He did not mean that. He is tired and—"

"Don't patronize me, Granger. I know what I said."

"I know you have been through a lot today, Draco, but you need to understand that you are this child's world, and every time you say something like what you just said, it hurts her."

"Like I care what—"

"But you should!" Hermione realized that she had shouted, and took a deep breath, allowing her shoulders to relax a bit, brushing another kiss against the top of her daughter's head. "You should care, because this morning you would have cared. Last week you would have cared. Eventually you will care again, and you will not want the guilt from this plaguing you once you do."

"How could you possibly know what I will want?"

"Because believe it or not, Draco, I know you better than anyone else. We are married. Look." She held out her left hand to display the wedding band that was on her hand that had once belonged to his grandmother.

It had a triangle shaped diamond surrounded by three connected circles almost as though there were three snakes tied in a knot around the center. It was clearly expensive, and when he first gave it to her, she had tried to turn him down, saying that it was too much for her to wear every day. But he had somehow convinced her that the ring was very special to him, so she had accepted it. However, it was a one-of-a-kind piece, and there was no mistaking it.

"You've kidnapped me, wiped my mind, _and _stolen from me?" Draco was growling at her as he stared at the ring. "That was my grandmothers and you have taken it. Where did you find it? How?"

"Draco, please calm down. You gave it to me almost five years ago when you asked me to marry you."

"I would never allow a mudblood to wear a Malfoy family heirloom. That ring has been in my family for centuries. Take it off this instant! I will not have you stealing from me!"

"I did not steal it, Draco. I don't even know where you kept it while you were in school. Presumably it was at your home considering you never thought you were going to marry anyone, let alone me."

"How would you know that?"

"You told me. You said _I _changed your mind. You said that when it came time your parents would likely have to arrange a marriage for you to some pureblood girl who had as much personality as a dung beetle. So you said you would rather suffer through life alone than end up with Sally Piss-for-Brains, if I remember correctly. But then you said you got to know me and it changed things."

"That's ridiculous."

"No, what's ridiculous is that you won't listen to anyone simply because we are saying things you find difficult to hear."

Draco paused, looking her over. She definitely wasn't the same Granger he'd known in school. She seemed a bit taller and her hair was shorter. She wore it around her shoulders now. There were crinkles forming by the sides of her eyes that would likely one day soon turn into laugh lines. She was a bit wider around the hips and her chest was fuller than he remembered, although he never really paid much attention. Her robes were navy blue and bore the Ministry of Magic crest on them, although the top was undone and he could see a simple yellow sweater underneath. All-in-all, she didn't appear to be anything out of the ordinary, and she certainly had her story very well rehearsed.

The one thing that he couldn't shake, however (besides his bloody awful headache) was the fact that she was wearing his grandmother's ring. She said that he'd given it to her, but his father would have skinned him alive if he'd given away any sort of family treasure to a blood traitor, let alone a muggle born. There was only one solid explanation.

"So you must have had an imitation made then?"

"That's not what I—no. I didn't."

"How else could you have a ring that looks so much like my family heirloom when there is no way you possessed that actual piece of history?"

"Did you hear nothing I just said? This is the actual—"

"You are pathetic if you think I'm going to buy that."

"You are pathetic if you think I would steal from you."

They glared at each other, Hermione feeling very much like she had stepped into her school self for the amount of loathing she seemed to be producing.

"Please don't make me feel this way, Draco. Please make an effort or—"

"You are wasting my time here, Granger. I have apparently been through quite an ordeal and have been recommended rest. You're ruining it."

"I'm not going anywhere. Not until you see to reason that—"

"No fight," Lacey urged again, not understanding the conversation, but understanding the emotions. "Daddy come home."

"Not tonight," Hermione repeated more harshly than she'd intended, her stern gaze simply begging Draco to mock her again, but he remained silent, simply staring at the two people standing next to his bed.

Suddenly, the quiet that had spread between them was broken as Draco noticed Harry and Ron lurking by the doors of the ward, conversing with the Healers.

"Are you lot claiming to be my _only_ friends now?! What is this, an ambush!? Take me back to the castle right now! Where is Snape? Where is my father?" The panic set in as he fell into a panic attack, his screams cutting through Hermione like swords. "HELP! HELP ME! I'VE BEEN KIDNAPPED! I'VE BEEN STOLEN BY BLOOD TRAITORS AND MUDBLOODS! FATHER! CRABBE! GOYLE! HELP! CALL THE LAW ENFORCEMENT! "

As the three elderly Healers rushed over to administer a calming drought to put him to sleep, Hermione looked him straight in the eyes, her own narrowed to say, "I _am_ the law enforcement. Sweet dreams, Draco."

It only took a few seconds for his eyes to flutter closed. As soon as he was sound asleep, Hermione collapsed on the foot of his bed, Lacey still in her arms. "Mum? Why did Daddy yell?"

"Shhh, love. It's going to be okay…" Hermione reassured her child and herself as she sobbed into the top of her daughter's head, stroking her curls. Harry and Ron looked on from the doorway with pained expressions.

* * *

_The hallway was so dark that she couldn't see her own hand in front of her face. And that's exactly where it was. Both of her hands were outstretched awkwardly as she tried to feel her way across the meeting room, hoping that Draco would walk in and wave the lights on._

"_Draco? Are you there? Bugger it all-" Her hand hit a wall, forcing her to change her course. Draco wasn't answering her, but he must be close by because he'd just sent her an office memo to meet him here. In her haste to meet him, she hadn't even retrieved her wand from her desk drawer, so she was in their usual meeting place with no wand and no idea if he was actually on his way or not. _

_She turned to leave, following the wall back toward the door she'd entered so as not to lose her footing when a wand lit up across the room. _

"_Draco?"_

_He was sitting on a table, cross-legged and staring at the light at the end of his wand. He looked very much like a small child enchanted by the flicking flames of fire for the first time. _

"_What are you doing?"_

"_How did you just feel while you were wandering about in the dark?" he asked her quietly, setting his wand down, but with the tip lit up so they could still faintly see each other. _

_She took a few steps to be closer to him, reaching out to put a hand on his knee to ease her discomfort of the dark. "I felt lost," she admitted. "I didn't know if you were in here and I didn't know why it was so dark. I still don't know, to be frank seeing as you have your wand." _

_He nodded. "You felt lost. You felt like no matter how far outstretched you kept your hand it would never be far enough to protect you from the dark."_

"_What are you going on about? Why are the lights off?"_

"_Hermione, before I got to know you, I was always lost. I was always in the dark. And I thought that if I kept my hand in front of me and my wand in my pocket just in case, that I'd always be able to see just enough to get by. But then I got to know you and suddenly..." He picked up his wand and flicked it with a flourish and suddenly thousands of blinking fireflies came into view. They were covering the walls and the ceiling, blinking beautifully and casting a romantic glow over the two of them. _

_Hermione gasped, taken aback by the sudden appearance of so many twinkling lights. _

"_I got to know you, and suddenly all the lights came on. And then I could see. I see you. The real you. I don't see your blood or your family, but I see you." He bit his lip and took a deep breath. Her hand on his knee gave a little squeeze which gave him the courage to continue. _

"_I am so genuinely sorry for every ounce of heartache I have ever caused you. If I could have known back in my first year what knowing you would do for me, I would have let you turn the lights on a long time ago. I can't imagine ever going back to how it used to be in the darkness. I will never desert you or leave you without any light."_

"_I know," she whispered, blinking back tears as she smiled at him. _

"_I'm not one for long, sappy speeches," he laughed. "It took me a week to coordinate all these fireflies and I didn't have a lot of time to really think about what I wanted to say. So just know that I never thought I'd be here, loving you the way I do. But I am. And I do."_

_He reached into the pocket of his robes and pulled out a little velvet box. He cracked it open and inside there sat a beautiful diamond ring. It had so many diamonds on it that it sparkled more than any firefly in the room. It was the most unique ring Hermione had ever seen and was likely very old and very expensive. _

"_Draco, I-" she stammered, staring at the ring._

_He slid down off of the desk and lowered himself onto one knee. "I know I'm nothing you ever dreamed about having in your life, but I'm yours if you'll have me. Hermione, will you marry me?"_

_Hermione closed her eyes extremely tightly and stood there, not uttering a word. _

_After a few seconds passed, Draco awkwardly cleared his throat a little. "Erm, Hermione? What are you doing?"_

_Hermione relaxed her face and opened her eyes. "I was just making sure I was awake because this is exactly what I dream about every night." _

_She grabbed his hand and pulled him to his feet, bringing their lips together. After one long, deep kiss, she pulled back and whispered, "Yes. I'll marry you."_

_His smile was the biggest she'd ever seen light up his face. It looked almost unnatural that the boy she'd gone to school with and hated so much should be so happy from something she'd said. He lifted the ring from the box and went to slide it onto her finger. _

"_Draco," she whispered urgently, pulling her hand back. "I'll marry you, but I can't take that ring. It's too much. I- It's just too..."_

_He fiddled with the ring for a moment, shifting it back and forth between his thumb and forefinger. "This ring belonged to my grandmother. She died when I was six and it was all she left to me. I know she probably intended for me to give it to some frilly little pureblood with nothing on her mind but fashion, parties, and producing more purebloods, but all she said when she gave it to me as she lay dying was to give it to the one I could trust with my heart." _

_He reached for her hand and slid it into place on her left hand ring finger. "I'm trusting you with my heart, Hermione. Keep it safe? Keep me from the dark?"_

_Hermione smiled down at the all-too-expensive family heirloom on her finger and nodded. "Forever."_

* * *

Draco felt himself sliding from a dream, one which he could not remember, which was a far cry from his usual haunting nightmares. He stretched his limbs, feeling them tighten in a soothing way, releasing all the tension he had gone to sleep feeling.

He opened his eyes, cringing against the fluorescent glow that somehow had infiltrated the room. He opened them completely and realized he was in the hospital. Then he remembered.

"Did you sleep well?"

His head snapped to the left where he saw Hermione Granger sitting in a chair by his bed, a scarf and two knitting needles lying across her lap, her eyes fixated on him with an uncomfortable intensity.

"I-wh-what're you-"

"I'll take that as a yes."

She picked up her knitting began looping yarn over needles nonchalantly as though it was ordinary for her to be visiting him in the hospital—almost as if she had done it every day for some time.

"How long was I asleep?"

Hermione glanced at the clock that was on the wall at the end of the ward and declared, "Oh, about thirteen hours. Usually you are only able to manage five or six at the most, so I would say that this was an improvement."

"How are you—what have you—what has happ—where is my father?" He stuttered around, not sure which of his hundreds of questions was the right one to ask, but finally family won out. His father knew everything that happened with the Ministry, so if they were involved in this at all, surely he would have been here by now, in a rage and ready to see heads rolling. Yet he was alone, and the ward was quiet.

"Draco, there has been an—"

"I know, I know. There's been 'an accident' and blah blah blah. Tell me something I don't already know, _Granger_!"

Hermione sighed and set down the lumpy pile of yarn in her hands that Draco could not distinguish between a hat, a scarf, or a quaffle-warmer. "I had hoped you might have made some progress while you were asleep, but I suppose those hopes were too high."

"Get out. I did not ask for this! I DO NOT WANT TO BE HERE! LET ME GO! LET ME—"

Suddenly, Draco's mouth was still moving, but no sound was coming out. He glanced down and grabbed at his throat with a horrified expression. Hermione passively stared at him, giving her wand a menacing wave. "Silencing charm," she chirped sweetly, earning a look that shot daggers from her agitated husband.

"Listen, Draco. I know this is hard for you to believe, but you are my_ husband_, and I agreed to be in this for better or for worse. Clearly this is the worse side of things, but I am still here. I will not quit on you, and if you were in your right mind, you would not be quitting on me. Your 'mission' that you seem so set to complete _failed_ almost ten years ago. You did not kill Dumbledore."

Draco's eyes widened at her words, but he could not retaliate.

"Yes, I know all about your mission to kill Dumbledore as well as your several failed attempts throughout the year. One of them almost killed Katie Bell, and another almost killed Ron. Your final attempt, albeit the closest to success, still failed."

He tightened his knuckles until the skin was pulled taught, wanting to badly to scream at her for all she was saying, but not being able to produce any sound. His mission could not have failed or his entire family would be in danger. If he didn't warn them, it would be his fault if they all died, and here she was just calmly chatting about it. If what she said was true, he needed to get out of the bed he was in.

"I see the fear in your eyes. No, you did not succeed, but Dumbledore did die. Snape killed him for you. In the Astronomy tower. Congratulations on fixing the vanishing cabinet, however. Judging from what you have told me, it took quite a fair bit of magic on your end."

Draco's chest was heaving, his hands back to clutching his silent throat. The veins in his forehead were bulging from the stress of not being able to shout and curse her for her words.

"Sirius Black, Harry's godfather, once said that the ones who love us never really leave us, so I know you are in there, Draco. Once you decide that I might be right, you can come home. You don't have to stay here in this hospital. You can come home and eat some real food and sleep in your own bed. But I will not let you return like this. I will not keep you under a silencing charm and I will not treat you like a child. You will come home when you're ready, and I am hoping that you see reason and that happens sooner rather than later, if not for my sake, then for our daughter's.

"I love you, Draco Malfoy, but not like this. I can tell by the look of disgust you are giving me that you don't want me to say that, but I will not hide the truth from you. Harry loves you, Ron loves you,_ I_ love you, so please try. This is not a trick. This is not a test. This is simply your family attempting to help you, so please let us. Please at least entertain the possibility that we may be right."

She lifted the silencing charm from him and thrust three pieces of paper in his hands before grabbing her bag and her knitting and exiting the ward, not leaving him any time to retaliate as he gawked awkwardly after her.

Granger had always had a way with words, but they had never before left him speechless.

Healer Malone rushed right over, filling the space Hermione had been occupying almost before she had left it. "Oh, good! You're awake! What did your wife leave you? Anything exiting?" She busied herself in straightening his blankets and adjusting the lighting.

He glanced down into his hands at the papers she had left him. They were flipped upside down, so all he could see were their white undersides. "I'm not sure," he mumbled, forgetting to be rude or nasty to the woman who was far too close for comfort.

"Flip them over! Let's see!"

She was far too eager, and Draco longed to tell her to buzz off and mind her own business, but his own curiosity was far too great.

He turned over the largest piece of paper first. He stared at it for a few moments, his eyes mirrored and vacant.

As if to echo his worst nightmare, Healer Malone annoyingly read it out loud over his shoulder:

_"Marriage solemnized at The Burrow, near the village of Ottery St. Catchpole in Devon, England. Date of marriage December 2nd, 2000. Draco Lucius Malfoy, Auror, age 20 to Hermione Jean Granger of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, age 21. Married by Minister Kingsley Shacklebolt—oh how lovely, the Minister himself—under the accordance of—"_

"ENOUGH!" Draco shouted, ripping the paper from her grasp and shoving it childishly under his pillow. "So she faked a marriage certificate. That's easy enough, isn't it?"

Healer Malone seemed slightly flustered, but still urged him to flip over the other two papers lying across his lap. He turned them simultaneously to find that they were both photographs.

The first was of himself and Granger standing in an archway of yellow flowers. Granger was wearing a long white dress, clearly a wedding gown, and he was wearing a tuxedo with a little yellow rose pinned to the lapel. In the picture, he was dipping her backward so that he could kiss her lips with an enthusiasm that was bringing laughter to them both. He cast the photograph aside in disgust.

The second picture was of him holding a small bundle of blankets in his arms with a grin on his face. Granger was in the background looking fatigued and with no makeup, but she too was smiling, watching him fold back the blankets to gaze at their sleeping child. That photograph joined the first on the floor as Draco turned onto his side, his back to Healer Malone who was cooing about how precious the child was.

"I'm hungry. Bring me my breakfast," Draco demanded loudly, causing the elderly woman to jump. She did, however, turn to go find him food, leaving him alone to his thoughts, not that they were any more pleasant than her company had been.

He could not deny photographic evidence, although everything in his brain was telling him to do just that. Then again, Granger was the cleverest in their year, so if anyone could bewitch or charm something into a fake photograph, it would be her.

He flipped back over onto his other side and reached down to the floor to retrieve the fallen rectangles of paper. He glanced at both one more time, searching for signs of an enchantment. Seeing none, he glanced around his bed for the one thing that could ease his restless thoughts.

"If you're looking for your wand, Mr. Malfoy, it was taken when you came in until we can prove you are in your right mind," a Healer across the way told him as she handed a stack of letters to the former Professor Lockhart, who eagerly snatched them from her. Lockhart had gone grey since Draco had last seen him, but that could easily be explained by the stress of memory loss rather than passing time. After all, Draco now knew first-hand how stressful the whole ordeal actually was. "You shouldn't be needing it anyway. We'll get you anything you might need," the Healer assured him, causing his jaw to tighten.

Damn them all. They had confined him to this bed, they had taken his memories, and now they had also taken his only source of independence. Not only that, but the fact that they still had his wand meant that they thought he was crazy.

No matter. There was no magic required for what he needed to do. With an angry snarl, Draco tore the pictures right down the middle, and then again. He repeated this until he had nothing more than a little pile of confetti on his blanket. With one big gust of air, he blew the pieces so that they scattered all around him creating a very satisfying mess of the photographs that were now beyond repair.

* * *

A/N: Yep. Two updates in one day. I should win a cookie or something.

But in all seriousness, I'm going to need some motivation to get the next chapter typed because I LOVE the story I have planned out, but it takes a lot of time to transfer things from my head to my computer. I really hope that everyone's liking it so far and I'll try really hard to not wait another 10 months before updating because I know how annoying it is to get into a story and then have it taken from you for long periods of time. So I'm really going to try. That being said, please feel free to review!

xo Ashley


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